Scuba weekend

Friday finished up all the knowledge reviews and quizzes for my scuba certification. First class in the pool this evening. It was very cool to hang out underwater and breathe. We were in the pool for about three hours on Friday night. It is a class size of 7 people, one instructor and one assistant instructor. I was fortunate enough to be paired up with the assistant instructor as my buddy for all the skills tests and modules. On a another sweet note, a girl in our class was a member of the USA olympic synchronize swimming team. She gave us a quick demo, amazing to see up close. Yeah I know, nice story bro. Saturday At the pool early for few hours of classroom, four more hours in the pool and then I headed to Denver for dinner. Won't go into detail about all the scuba skills I learned but am feeling confident that I won't have any problems passing my open water certification. Shutting your air off at the bottom of the pool is not as bad as I thought it would be. Sunday Four more hours in the pool, followed by taking our final. I got 100%, almost all the questions were pretty common sense. Stayed after class and got fitted for all the gear that I will need in the future. I am scheduled to do my open water certification dives(4 of them) on June 09/10 at Chattfield Reservoir near Denver. Plenty of time for me to get my C-card and be legit to dive in Thailand during my up and coming trip.

it's the new style

a new approach to my old blog, updating daily in the form of drafts but posting when I have written enough gibberish and nonsense that is sufficient to be deemed blog worthy. We shall see how long that lasts. Monday: Legs are tired so I didn't do much in the way of working out/running etc. Cleaned up my life, Cleaned up my clothes and changed my bike chain on my mountain bike. In the future, I need to make sure that the chain goes through the derailer correctly before I link the chain back together. 1 & 1/2 hours later, my simple project was completed and my mountain bike is rolling with a new chain. whoop, whoop. Tuesday: I met Maggie in the town of Idaho springs for a 13 mile ride UP to echo lake (3,056 ft climb) on tired legs. I was pitiful, slow and downright sad. Legs are still trashed. Going down (3,056 ft descent) Fast and a wee bit chilly. Maxed out at 41 mph and on skinny tires feels effing fast. The pro riders have some skills and balls, since they are going a lot faster than that. Good ride overall but I'm going to listen to what my body is screaming at me. YOU NEED ANOTHER REST DAY. Only Slacklining tomorrow. Wednesday: Studying for my Dive certification all day and filling out all of the necessary paperwork for my class this weekend. Running. NAH. teeter tottering on a two week taper. This might drive me a little insane. Long runs are done, now just keeping mentally focused, playing the sections over in my mind and figuring out what to bring. on a side note: Been looking into getting Lasik surgery done, if I can, in the next few weeks(after MMT, before Hardrock 100). Reasons: 1. tired of buying new glasses 2. tired of wearing glasses and scratching my lenses 3. much better for scuba diving/snowboarding/running. 4. Want to wear real sunglasses because the skies in CO are so blue and sunny. 5. Why not? 6. so I can buy designer eyewear, just to be a hipster, with no purpose but to accentuate my cheekbones. haha whatever and kidding of course but no for real, "hey filthy fresh white guy, I love your rec specs" in the deepest sexiest Barry White voice I can muster. "why thank you for the compliment my dear, I wear these just for you" That would be downright just plain sweetness. Questions before I commit 1. it is a laser surgery in my eyes, I would much rather see than be blind from a botched surgery 2. How will this procedure effect my eyes during running, at night, with a headlamp, when i am tired? 3. How will it effect my vision on high mountain peaks. In the cold/when I play outside for long periods of time? 4. How long will recovery take? 5. While you are in their, messing with my eyeballs, can you change the color of my pupils to Red so I will look like a demon in every pic that is taken and people will think that his/her camera is messed up? Thursday: My wonderful great news today is that my left riblets are 97.4523% healed and i can barely feel the small twinge of pain from when I performed an implantation on them with the hard plastic of my mp3 whilst snowboarding. Pre acrobatic mishap, I was in a three day groove with my Ab workouts. I was eating, reading, driving and sleeping in the plank positions, sit-ups in the waiting line of the post office and grocery store, leg lifts in the library and shower, only about two years away from becoming an abdominal muscles model for Hollister and Abercrombie and fitch. I was a machine. My weeks long hiatus and setback has taken its toll, all that prep work for not. That hill is to big to conquer and I am sad to say that I may never obtain that status and have now set my sights on late night modeling for juicers, food sealers, george foreman grills or ab roller informercials. Oh and I ran 5 miles today. sorry no photos, wasn't feeling very genic

Week revisited(Mt. Evans)

Wonderful, fun week. I had a solid, solid 7 mile run on the Evergreen Mountain course on Monday. Don't really remember how Tuesday went but I'm sure it was super fly. Spent Wednesday in Boulder and a run up the famous Green mountain and then backyard Slack lining with my climbing boys from Boulder and a late night viewing of Team America. Friday Bob and I were dropped off at Echo lake and hiked the road up to Summit lake park. The last mile was brutal. Very windy and cold. On the way up, we saw three mountain goats.

We took shelter at the climbers hut. The window was broken out and the door must of opened during a recent storm. These are some pics of were we slept.

Day 2 The next morning, we continued our hike to the top of Mt. Evans(14,265 ft) in windy, cold conditions but blue, sunny skies. Three more mountain goats on the way up. They taunt me with their mountain climbing skills.

We set up our camp site in a burned down visitors center to try and break the wind. Below are a few pics of where we slept and how windy it gets up top. The observatory had its roof blown off. Sleep was very hard to come by and at times in the night the wind was picking me up, while in my sleeping bag and bivey sack, and moving me. I had to pee so bad but was afraid that if I got up out of my sleeping bag that all my gear would blow off the mountain. Not very fun holding it for 6 hours. The gazillion stars were bright, vibrant and right in my face. The Denver glow was an awesome visual as a back drop for my own private artistic masterpiece. If you have never spent time high upon a mountain away from the city lights at night, I suggest at sometime in your life you get to experience such grand views, Amazeballs.

Day 3 Got an early start to a long day. Descended Mt. Evans and climbed Rosalie peak(13,575 ft), Bandit peak(12,444 ft) and pegmatite points(12,227 ft) and headed East on ridges, through saddles and up over peaks. Their was a sense of adventure, following a map, not knowing were I was and how long it would take to get back home. Putting the Wild in Wilderness. Scree fields and the north face snow fields slowed us down. I got frustrated post holing through knee deep snow and wanted to sit down and wait for all the snow to melt. Eventually, we got to the Cub creek trail. More snow. The views were great but I was not having a good time, cutting up my legs and freezing my feet. Irritated, I wanted this adventure to be over. We Keep pushing and eventually, the snow disappeared as we got lower in elevation. Happy Bill is back as the last few miles are on roads to arrive back at the house some thirteen hours later. Worn out, feet and legs sore but soul refreshed and mentally recharged. Below looking back at the Sawtooth

from Rosalie peak

snow chute

Three days 7,000 ft plus of climb 10,000 ft plus of descent. about 40 miles. 2 cold and frozen feet. What will next weekend hold?

intelligence, changes in plans and just plain excitement

I just deleted two people on Facebook that posted a picture of a sign stating "Welcome to Kenya" Birthplace of Barack Obama. If they are that dumb, I do not want to be associated with people of that intelligence. Unfriend feels so good. I don't mind opposing political views but come on. That is just stupid.

Made changes to my travel plans for my trip to VA during MMT 100. Initially, I was going to fly in on Thursday May 10 and leave the following Monday morning. Now, I will be in the DC area for the following week, Departing on May 20th. I have not spent much time in our nations capital site seeing and thought this would be a golden opportunity to recover from a 100 miler and enjoy some of the touristy stuff that this city has to offer.

The next few weeks, I will be attending classes to become a certified scuba diver.
Why would I need to become a certified scuba diver living in Colorado? I leave for Thailand in late July through the middle of August and plan on doing some diving while visiting this area. Super excited to hang out in Bangkok, Phuket, Phi Phi and Krabi. More to come on this later.

weekly happenings

Had big plans for a lots of miles this week but plans are subject to change. After a much needed rest day on Tuesday, I went to Keystone snowboarding on Wednesday. The snow was Ok in the early morning and then got really slushy as it warmed up to 55 degrees. This is a first for me. On a mountain, snowboarding in a t-shirt. Feeling like a boss, I headed to the terrain park. Second box that I tried a board slide on, I caught an edge, landed on my ass, smashed my left rib hit it hard enough to shatter my mp3 screen. Smashed my left hand....again. Damn and ouch. Decided to leave the rails and boxes alone and went to the jumps. Launching myself off one of the hits, Looked good flying through the air. Landed horrible and not so graceful. I was having a rough day Balance was def off. Decided to get off this mountain as fast as possible before I broke something. Hanging up the snowboarding for the year.
for the year: 18 days on the mountain strapped to my board
210,918 vertical feet
Still sore after 9 miles today on some new trails in the Mt. Evans Wilderness. This trail system, once I learn them, will open a vast amount of long runs with tons of climbing. Looking at the maps, I will be able to link these trails to Mt. Evans and Bierstadt both 14ers.

New growth after a burn











Leg of Elk. MMMMMMMM delicious









Teepee